Episode Three: The Crash Years
by this-tornado
Summary: Roswell is a city no stranger to aliens or conspiracy theories, but when a mysterious object falls from the sky, UNIT has no choice but to call in the biggest expert of them all: the Doctor.
1. There's no other show like it round here

"Jelly baby?" Cat held out a particularly crunched looking white paper bag as she perched herself on a railing across from the main control set.

The Doctor looked up at her from whatever it was that he was fiddling with on underside of the console, intrigued. "Where did you get those from?" He asked, taking one and inspecting it. "I haven't seen those for…" He paused for a moment, obviously trying to do some sort of math in his head, the fact that he was a time traveler making everything that much more difficult, "…roughly two hundred years."

"No idea." She shrugged, inspecting the next one before popping it in her mouth. She knew she probably shouldn't eat food that she'd found wandering about the TARDIS, particularly not two hundred year old food, but she figured the jelly babies would be safe enough. "I was trying to find the library and I ended up in the swimming pool, and I'm really not sure where I got to from there." Given her general dampness, it was fairly clear that she really had ended up _in_ the swimming pool. It wasn't _quite_ as bad as the first time she'd tried to find something particular, gotten hopelessly lost, and had to be rescued from a guest bedroom, but it was pretty close.

He gave her a look fairly similar to the one he usually gave her when he'd been explaining something in great detail and she didn't understand a word, but just ate the jelly baby and let it go. "So, there's been a change of plans," He began, sliding off those glasses that seemed to come from nowhere, back into one of those never-ending pockets.

She looked up from the bag, confused. "I wasn't aware that we had plans."

He continued, not acknowledging the fact that she'd been in the pool when he'd made whatever plans he'd made, and quite obviously hadn't been around for him to inform. "I got a call-"

"You got a call? Like, a phone call? You have a phone? With a number?" She interrupted, incredulous. "Where are we, anyway? How can you call someone who's in space? Does your phone only work when we're places that actually have phones?"

He gave her that look again, wondering why it was that phones, of all the things that she knew about him, that amazed her so very much. "It's not my phone," he began, not really wanting to go into who it was that had given it to him and who had the number, "and it's Universal Roaming. Service anywhere in space and time, and you never have to worry about a signal."

"So you could call anyone?" She asked for clarification, suddenly a little more serious. She'd just sort of blown off her parents the last time she'd talked to them, not exactly wanting to talk immediately after everything had gone down. And now that she was off traveling, she felt like she really ought to drop them a line just to tell them she was alright, even if she couldn't tell them where she was, or when she'd be back. Even if it was a time machine, and technically could drop her off only moments after she'd left, it just seemed like it might be a good idea…

He caught the gradual guilt in her voice and the meaning easily enough, as it wasn't like she was the first person to have ever traveled with him. Not the first person he'd dragged from their cozy, boring little world into the wonder. "If you've got someone you'd like to call," he held out a hand, expectantly.

She dug through her pockets, where she'd been keeping her mobile, as next-to-useless as it was floating out wherever they were parked, out of nothing more than a force of habit.

He passed over it with the screwdriver for a moment, obviously doing something, before tossing it back. "Go ahead." There was a measure of understanding in his eyes as he looked at her, something gentle. He flapped a hand at her, jumping up to start throwing switches and dials to prepare for takeoff. "I'll tell you when we've landed." Not that she'd really be able to miss it, what with the general hurtling about…

"Oh." That should have been obvious, that he was doing whatever he could to help her out, but it still surprised her, the possibilities that flung here and there off him like drops of water. She looked down at the phone in her hand, now something more, now a connection to a family she felt guiltily for having shrugged off so quickly. Scampering off, she found herself a semi-private corner of the room. Dialing the number, she hit send, and held it up to her ear, still not really expecting it to work.

Didn't expect to hear those familiar rings, and her mother's relieved "hello?"

"Hey," She breathed, still a little amazed. "I'm just calling to check in, you know…"

"I figured," Her mother replied gently, putting down the newspaper she'd been reading a more complete account of the accident at the university. "How are you feeling? Ready to come home?"

"What-" Cat began, before realizing how she'd left off her last conversation. Another bit of guilt, at having moved on so quickly. For having been so distracted by the shiny trappings of her new life. "I'm doing fine, really. And that's just what I wanted to call about, see, a- a friend, and I," because she had no other words for him that her mother would understand, that would make sense at all for someone who didn't know everything, "well, we're going to do some traveling, I think. Get away, you know? Clear our heads." Behind her, the familiar vworp-ing began, as did a sudden tilt to the side.

"Well, I suppose I understand," She didn't really, not at all, but she could try to pretend, "and if that's really what you want- what's that in the background?"

Cat, clinging on to the railing for dear life, tried to find a plausible explanation. "We're at a train station, sorry- it was all such an impulse thing, and I just wanted to let you know before-" Something made a distinctly un-trainlike sound behind her, and she could hear him furiously throwing switches and smacking at something. "But I've got to go!" and hung up. She didn't hear her mother's "talk to you later" to the dead line, with the quiet suspicion, too wrapped up in feeling better for having talked to them, proved she remembered them, to realize that she'd probably left them with more unanswered questions than anything else.

"We've landed," He was sparkling with excitement again, appearing over her shoulder. Those eyes were still too intense, they always were, but there was lightness to them now, his excitement catching.

"Where are we?" She asked, mood much lighter with relief that she'd gotten that taken care of, throwing the phone back in a pocket.

"Try and guess," He pushed her towards the doors, grabbing his coat as they went, enjoying the reveal as much as anything, riding on the possibility of it all.

She did a brief jump of a dance of excitement, pushing the doors open. Where could they be? Far into a fabulous future? In the past, playing with kings? Somewhere fantastic-

She stuck her head out, only to be promptly hit with a face-full of desert wind and sand. "Ooh!"

He popped up behind her again, far more enthusiastic than she was managing at the moment, looking out over the dusty street. "Twenty-first century, Roswell, New Mexico."


	2. Windows were rolled for the crash years

"New Mexico?" She looked at him, deeply unamused. "Really?"

"Alien capital of the world." He dragged her out of the police box by the hand, taking a moment to lock up behind them as he continued his monologue. "Well, not really. That would be Cardiff. Or New York, depending on you look at it…"

"Cardiff? Well, I guess it could be worse," She muttered, throwing dubious glances about them as they strode along, taking in the tacky street signs and billboards proclaiming this place and that place to be 'out of this world' or whatever space-like tagline was currently in vogue.

"A capital of conspiracy theories, now, definitely," He continued, ignoring her comment. "Oh, look. A museum!" His enthusiasm was not supported by the weathered-looking signs and fading proclamations of 'the proof of extra-terrestrial life'.

Cat rolled her eyes as he dragged her along inside. "Don't you see enough aliens not to need museums on them?" She murmured, though mildly entertained by the irony of wandering about an alien museum with, well, an alien.

He didn't seem to hear her, fluttering as he was around the dusty glass-front cases, calling out a litany of excited "Wrong! Wrong! Wrong, I think that's a blender. Wrong!" as he went, ignoring the nasty looks he was being shot by an offended-look proprietor, before pausing and squinting at something. "Well, now, _that's_ interesting."

"Is it alien?" She asked as quietly as she could, not exactly wanting to get thrown out of the however-questionable establishment, as she peered at whatever the garishly painted bit of metal was supposed to be, interested in spite of herself.

"Yes, actually it is, but they got it wrong," He continued, seemingly more interested in the things that they'd gotten wrong, than he was in the fact that it was actually almost right.

"So it's not a 'double-barreled ray gun'?"

"No, it's a fire extinguisher. Awful paint job."

"Oh." She shrugged it off, almost a little disappointed that the only real thing this shabby little place had was misidentified. "Well, they had to get something right eventually. Didn't you say we were going to meet someone?" She went on, wondering why, if they had to change plans so suddenly, they were wasting time wandering around critiquing tourist traps.

"I was a little off, we're a bit early," he clarified, as though that would make sense in any other context.

"So, what is it, exactly, that makes everything think it's the alien capital?" She asked, as they exited the shabby little place and continued on down the strip, passing several other kitschy little museums and a couple alien-themed wedding chapels. History of alien encounters (or un-encounters, as they were) wasn't exactly something covered in your average world history course. "You know, if it's not."

"Flashing lights in the sky, someone swears they've seen the military hiding bodies from a crash site, the usual," he did enjoy the silly little stories that human beings liked to tell themselves, the way they liked to fixate on what had such little evidence and base their entire belief systems around them, "of course, they weren't all that wrong," He continued, as they passed someone waving a sign that was very angry about further military cover-up. Cover-up of what, exactly, was left unclear.

"So there were aliens?" She raised an eyebrow. It would make sense, from all the alien-fervor, for there to be something behind it all, but it just seemed a little too hopelessly tacky to have had any basis in reality.

"Yes. Well, one alien. Well, more like half an alien. The bottom half." He equivocated. "It's what happens when you try to break the time limit."

"And the cover-up?" She continued, leaving the whole concept of a time limit alone. She had a feeling she wouldn't understand _that _explanation, not at all.

"Well," was all he needed to say, as what looked like your typical army transport rolled towards them, slowing to a stop.

"Oh." Was all she managed, as a man jumped out in full uniform, plus a rather dashing little red hat, other than hoping that this was who they were meeting, and not them being picked up for breaking any obscure American laws (was there an immigration protocol for time travelers? It was one of those questions that was going to keep her up at night).

"UNIT. Unified Intelligence Taskforce," The Doctor explained, cautioning the man striding towards him with a "_Don't_ you salute."

"No, sir," The man replied, with a grin and a salute. "It'd be an honor, sir."

The Doctor gave him a mildly aggravated sort of look, as though this was something he went through on a fairly frequent basis.

The man (the soldier, she substituted, spying the weapon tucked against his side) seemed too excited to respond to the look. "Really, sir, it's an honor," He repeated, before remembering his manners. "I'm Wilson, sir, and I've read all about you," He continued, babbling a little as he went about holding the door of the jeep for them, too distracted for the moment to bother acknowledging Cat.

"'I've read all about you'?" She murmured, as Wilson took a moment to walk around to the other side of the transport.

"I used to work for them," The Doctor explained, with a bit of a shrug. "Well, not here, but I never technically resigned, so when they need to call in an expert…" He didn't take every call from UNIT, not in the least. But this particular thing had come _very_ highly recommended.

"I see," though she really didn't. Cat settled back as Wilson hopped in and started up. It only made sense that someone that knew as much as he did would be called in occasionally, she just hadn't realized it was all so… official. It was just a little unsettling, knowing that there were governmental organizations devoted to extra-terrestrial intelligence gathering. It had started bothering her as soon as the black vans had shown up at the university, as soon as the press releases had contained official stories too pat not to have been rehearsed. Together, it made her wonder, really wonder, about all those weird things that had been happening the last couple of years. The Big Ben hoax, that Christmas star, the mass hallucinations… she wondered how much of it all had really been a hoax. And if she'd been lied to then, what _else_ could they be lying to her about?

They drove on through the dusty streets, out onto the desert proper, passing a huddled mass of people mobbing around a chain-link fence. "It's a good thing you came when you did, sir," Wilson continued, slowing to a crawl as the crowd began to turn on them, waving their signs and shouting, sunlight glinting off of more than a couple tinfoil hats. "The crazies have been going nuts all week, what with the lights in the sky."

"If you called us in, they weren't exactly wrong, then, were they?" Cat muttered more to herself than anything, feeling, for a moment, sympathy towards the conspiracy theorists. They'd probably be the only ones who'd ever believe her, if she tried to tell anyone about the Doctor.

He caught her comment, even if Wilson didn't, and gave her a reproving look, though he did have a pretty good idea of what was going on in her head, and couldn't entirely disapprove of the sentiment. "What sort of lights in the sky?"

"Colored streaky ones. Press release said it was just a comet, trying to throw them off it," Wilson explained as best he could, as they went on through more desert towards the base, much further back from the crazy-fence (as he liked to think of it) than one might expect. "'Cuz there was something that came down, landed right by the base. Can't tell you what, _way_ above my security clearance," That was added on sheepishly, as though he didn't want anyone to know that he wasn't as important as he wished he was, just a messenger sort. "All I know is, Homeland Security's gonna take over if they can't figure out what it is, and that's what they called y'all in here for." His voice had gotten steadily more informal as he'd relaxed, the Doctor's presence less intimidating once he'd failed to dismiss him out of hand the way his superiors did. Of course, he wasn't brave enough to ask any of the millions of questions he'd wanted to ask, had gone over in his head on his way to pick them up. He hadn't even gotten a peek at the TARDIS, which was what he'd really wanted, wanted to see if it was _really_ larger on the inside…


	3. Behind the walls of clocks

The hangar was full to the bursting with various uniformed officials bustling about trying to look more important than they really were, and only succeeding in getting in the way of those who were actually trying to accomplish something. But the hustle paused, at least for the moment, as they snapped to attention as the jeep rolled in.

Wilson hopped out first, throwing a salute as he held the door for his passengers. "Sir, The Doctor and his, uh, Companion." That was the right word, wasn't it? He hadn't really even noticed her, one of the privileged few chosen to hurtle through space and time. Part of it was, if he'd thought about it enough, or at all really, was that he wanted her to be special, just as fantastic as the Doctor himself, to the worthy enough. Wanted it to stay unattainable. "Doctor, Colonel Diaz."

The Colonel, a tall, imposing sort of man, nodded a brief dismissal to Wilson as he threw a salute towards the Doctor. "Have you been briefed on the situation, sir?" He asked; voice a reverberating bass well-matched to his forbidding exterior. Had they meet him under better circumstances, they might have seen the usual smile in his eyes, or perhaps even be greeted by a velvety chuckle. But the men in dark suits had him uneasy, had him wondering how long he was going to keep control of the situation.

"Somewhat," The Doctor allowed, picking up on the almost palpable tension. He wasn't fond of men with guns, and not that much fonder of mysterious men in dark suits, but a turf war between the two was the last thing he was interested in getting into.

"Well, if you and…" The Colonel paused, not sure on the proper term of address for a Companion.

"Ms. Davies," She supplied, not uneasy so much as a little irritated at having been almost entirely dismissed up until now. She knew she wasn't important, wasn't anything more than a sidekick, but she'd figured she was going to at least warrant a _name_.

He nodded acknowledgement. "If you and Ms. Davies would come with me, I can show you the object."

"When, exactly, did it come down?" As they wound through the twisting building, all grunt offices mixed in with labs and testing facilities, the Doctor relaxed slightly, preferring the scientific to the military.

"Eight days ago," Diaz elaborated as they worked their way down several flights of stairs towards the secure base of the building. "There was great deal of atmospheric disruption at the same time, lights in the sky, strange winds, enough we already had a team investigating when they found it.

"What, exactly, is 'it'?" It could have been anything, really, that fell from far enough away. And he was intrigued, had been enough already to agree to come, to see what it was that had come to visit and stumped several of UNIT's top scientists. It helped that it made him feel really rather important, to be called in where they hadn't been quite clever enough.

"That's just it, sir," Diaz murmured, quiet enough so as not to be overheard by any of the Homeland Security operatives that were wandering about the place, as he swiped them through the checkpoint. "We have no idea."

There was another swipe-point on the door to where the object was being held, though it was positioned as to make it unclear whether it was to keep the unwanted out, or something else in. "We've got the whole room bugged with sensors, but we're keeping the readings and machinery all next door. Just in case." There were new policies in place now, after that Torchwood One fiasco had rocked the investigative world, even this far overseas. "As far as we can tell, it's perfectly safe," The 'but we can't be sure' was left unsaid.

With such buildup, Cat was anticipating something truly spectacular, and was just a little bit let down by the reveal of a small, burnished orb roughly the size of a coconut perched on a pedestal in the center of the room. "Well." Was all she managed in response.

The Doctor ignored her, sliding those magically appearing glasses on, peering at the sphere with great interest. "Now, that _is_ interesting."

"Is it?" She whispered, moving closer. Obviously, there was more than met the eye here, and it had fallen from space, that was true, and it certainly didn't look like anything of earthly origin… but it was still just a round thing.

"It's definitely something," He continued unhelpfully as he circled the object, squinting as closely at it as he could without actually touching it. "What did you say the saturation levels were?" He turned from it to start peppering Diaz with questions concerning obscure measurements.

"I didn't, but if you'd like to see the monitors…"

Cat ignored the both of them, leaning in close enough to see her reflection in the shining (improbably shiny, for something having hurtled through space to crash in the desert) surface. Now that she was looking at it closer, there was something oddly… compelling about it. In fact, she tilted her head, holding her breath for a moment. Yes, there was the faintest sound that hadn't been her own, the slightest wavering-

"Come on," The Doctor's voice interrupted her thinking, and once she'd been distracted for the moment, she lost whatever it was that she'd been trying to find. Nodding, shaking it off as nothing, she trailed behind them as they securely locked up whatever it was.

The monitoring room was really rather like the TARDIS, at least as far as she was concerned. Filled with machinery, switches and knobs that seemed next to useless, and peppered with screens observing nothing at all, other than the globe-thing sitting there. Quietly. It was also exactly the sort of thing that the Doctor enjoyed, now flitting about from stations to station, questioning the technicians that had been doing a perfectly good job at nothing at all before he'd started interfering.

Watching him interrogate a particularly irritated looking young man in a lab coat about the radiation levels before and after the crash, Cat found herself suddenly hearing a snippet of whatever that had been that she'd almost heard in the globe-room. It was so soft, too soft to tell if it was a snatch of music, or a breath, or a whispered word… Shaking her head, she tried to ignore it. Hearing something through what had to be several layers of solid metal and concrete, particularly anything that soft, was ridiculous.

"What sort of imaging have you tried?"

She tried to concentrate on whatever he was saying as he leafed through files, running a hand through his already-mussed hair.

"Its reacting, whatever it is, did you see this?" He'd gotten distracted from the imaging already, holding up the saturation levels he'd originally been interested in. "Spiked while we were in the room. Definitely a sensory apparatus, though I can't tell if it's organic-"

There it was again, that half-sound that was more in her head than it was in the air around her. She shook her head again, slightly dizzy, hand at her temple. What was going on with her? There was something alien in the next room, something interestingly unknown, something that they needed to investigate, and here she was hearing things. "I'm going to go stand outside for a moment, alright?" She needed to get out for a moment, suddenly overwhelmed with the need to get out of this room, cramped and crowded as it was with flashing and beeping and screens.

He nodded, still absorbed in whatever he was reading about, flapping a hand at the door. "Just don't wander off," That was the first rule of anywhere they went, really, though there seemed a great deal more for her to get into in this sort of secure government building, particularly if there was a bureaucratic turf war going on. The last thing he needed was her getting carted off because she'd poked into the wrong files.


	4. Before the war

Leaning against the wall outside, Cat tried to steady herself. Eyes closed, she took a couple deep breaths, counting as she exhaled. She hoped it wasn't because she wasn't cut out for this, that she wasn't good enough to travel with him. That she was cracking already, barely into this relationship. Barely having seen anything, barely gone anywhere. It would be easier if he wasn't so unflappable, so comfortable with and thriving off of the chaos, for her to feel so momentarily fragile.

Because there it was again, a little clearer this time, like a breath's worth of a song. Biting her lip, frustrated, she turned deliberately away from the room that held whatever it was, too preoccupied to remember his warning. Maybe all she needed was walk. Just to get away from whatever it was that was in her head, from however she was managing to psych herself out. Just a walk to clear her head...

\

"There we go!" He held up the particular readings at the particular setting from the particular machine that he'd wanted, throwing it down on a desk near the center of the room.

"What is it?" Not much a scientist himself, Diaz looked, and felt, a little out of place in a room where the Doctor was flinging obscure measurements and terms around, though he'd felt a little bit better when the few real scientists had seemed a little taken aback themselves. The room had gotten gradually more crowded as word had gotten around that the Doctor was here, and that he was on to something. A few of the suits where there too, lurking in the background as they monitored the proceedings. They weren't the sort to trust an outside expert like the Doctor, particularly not one as unorthodox as he.

"I think I've got it," the Doctor continued, not in any hurry to reveal the news. "The outside's just a magnetized skin, and that's what's been throwing off the readings. Once you get past that, that's when things get interesting." He held up a radiated silhouette to the light, tracing the outline. "Because underneath the magnets, it's all organic material. Carbon, hydrogen, some oxygen, a little nitrogen… all encased in a preservative."

"So it's…" One of the lab workers, a short redhead, tried to fill in the blank, though she looked a little too incredulous to actually finish the sentence.

"Alive, yes. It's alive." The Doctor continued, sliding off the glasses as he reached his conclusion. It was too bad that Cat wasn't feeling well; she might have appreciated the reveal. And probably would've had some sort of well-placed question. He paused, fingering the glasses absently. Something about this wasn't quite right, and it wasn't only the absence of his companion. Running a hand through his increasingly-disheveled hair, he went back into the piles of paperwork, hunting.

\

Cat took the stairs a few at a time, feeling much better now that she'd gotten far enough away. She was a few floors below where they'd been stationed, and on the other side of the building. She hadn't been concerned with being able to find her way back, as everything was really all helpfully labeled and laid out on color-coded maps posted on the stairwells, and the further down she'd gotten, the more her head had felt like hers. Turning a corner, feeling really rather pleased with herself, she froze.

It was the same hallway that she'd just left, with the globe-room door bordered by the many locks, the room with all the equipment to the other side.

No, that was crazy. It just had to be one of those things, where the different floors had the same general floorplan, right? She couldn't have gotten that turned around, that was impossible. This wasn't the TARDIS, with far too many hallways and too many improbable rooms. This was just detailed maps and clear 'you are here's'. Completely impossible.

"_I think I've got it," _

She could hear his voice, faint as it was, and knew beyond a doubt that it was him, the Doctor, and that she'd not gotten very far at all. Well and truly spooked now, she looked from one door to the other, not really sure what she should be doing. They were busy figuring out whatever it was that had to be figured out, and were obviously too busy to be interrupted by her crazy theory.

Turning, deciding that obviously she had to go up this time, as the lower floors were just too interconnected, she found herself that much closer to the globe-room, hand out and reaching towards the door.

Jerking her hand back, she stared at the door that she definitely had not been that close to a moment ago. What was going _on_ here? Why did she keep finding herself closer and closer to that… thing, whatever it was?

That half-sound was louder now; enough that she could tell that it was a bit of music, or at least a series of notes, loud enough that she was sure that someone else had to be able to hear it…

Not sure what else to do, not really thinking that there was anything else that she could do, she reached out. The door was locked anyway; she'd watched the Colonel set them, that she knew for sure.

Silently, before her hand had even touched the handle, the locks released and the door swung ever so slightly open.

\

"From what I can tell," The Doctor wasn't done yet, gesturing towards more printouts that made no sense to anyone but him, "it's still in an embryonic state."

"So it was an egg," Diaz offered, feeling like he could follow this much of the conversation. The suits behind them had started taking notes, jotting words and whispering into mics with a terse code, and it had him on edge. If alive was bad, eggs were even more bad.

"No, that would be the problem," There was a seriousness to his voice now, something in those intense eyes setting anyone in the room who was paying the least bit of attention on edge. "It wasn't a sensory mechanism that we were detecting earlier," he threw down the graph illustrating the spike. "It was a trigger."

"What do you mean, it had a trigger?" Diaz was on full alert now, already half-planning an evacuation of the building in his head. There were protocols set up for exactly this sort of thing, and a large enough incinerator down the hall to take care of anything. And he needed action, prompt evasive action, before the suits (on full alert now, listing their own secondary protocols) usurped his role.

The Doctor looked at him, deadly serious now. "There are spider wasps that lay their eggs in living spiders, leaving the hosts alive just long enough to provide a first meal for their offspring. What we have here," he nodded towards the other room, "is a wasp." Something in the back of his mind was clicking together now, something just a little too far-

\

Cat stepped carefully through the door, on edge. It was like something was pulling her forward, some magnetic force that she couldn't quite resist, that music in her head growing louder and louder as she got closer.

The sphere (or whatever it was) was reacting to her presence, like it could sense her, vibrating in time with whatever was playing in her head.

She stepped forward, not because she wanted to but because she felt she had to, reaching out with an arm she didn't seem to quite control, until her hand touched the side of the metallic thing-

It was like it had exploded, the air suddenly filled with a black dust. She choked, breathing in whatever it was, grabbing at the pedestal as she felt her knees giving beneath her. Before she'd had a chance to try another breath to scream, her eyes rolled up in her head, and she collapsed.

\

The Doctor had been expecting a bit of a reaction to his reveal, he would have been a little disappointed if he hadn't gotten one at all, but he certainly hadn't expected every machine in the room to suddenly go absolutely mad, flashing and beeping and setting off every alarm they had to set off.

"What was that?" Sudden, unexpected things, when dealing with whatever it was that they were dealing with (he didn't like unknowns, didn't ever like not knowing, but it was the worry in the Doctor's eyes that worried him) were never a good sign.

"Absolutely no idea." But he did have an idea, he always had an idea, it was part of who he was. But he didn't want this idea, was starting to be very worried indeed. He turned to try and figure out what exactly was going on, when whoever it was that had been in charge of monitoring the screens set up to observe the egg, starting shouting.

Rushing over to stare over the technician's shoulder, he didn't need to see any more than a second of Cat reaching out towards the thing before he was dashing out of the room. It made sense, far too much sense- why hadn't he caught it earlier? It was so obvious now, knowing when he had all the pieces- "Don't!" Knowing she wouldn't hear him didn't help.

He was just in time to watch her fall.


	5. You're looking for the word

"No!" He dropped to his knees, frantically checking her vital signs, hoping for some obvious physiological explanation for her behavior that didn't involve her suddenly being the host for who-knew how many carnivorous creatures. A quick scan with the sonic screwdriver confirmed the obvious.

"What happened?" Diaz didn't need to ask, not really, he was intelligent enough to put the pieces of the Doctor's speeches together with the empty orb and the collapsed girl, but he was rather hoping that it wasn't as it appeared.

The Doctor looked up at him, in some obvious distress. "The wasps, as you'd called them," it wasn't a perfect analogy, but it was worked, "they have a certain amount of psychenetic ability. Suggestion, if you will, to help them lure in a compatible host. That's what the spike we detected earlier was, they were finding her compatible." He ran a hand through his hair, his tension and general regret at not having figured it out earlier obvious. And _of course_, of all of the hundreds of people in the building alone, much less the surrounding area, she had to be the one they found the most compatible. It was always how it seemed to work.

"Is there anything you can do?" Diaz gestured over the various technicians and scientists, hoping that at least accurate measurements would be of use.

"There's a window before they've fully acclimated to her system, where they can still exist outside of her." He attached the sensors to her himself, not quite sure he trusted anyone else with this delicate of an operation. There were ways to get rid of them after that window, once they'd really become a part of her, there had to be, but those were going to get more and more invasive, and it wouldn't really do him any good to kill the creatures and be left with only half a companion.

"How long?" Diaz wasn't sure if he was asking how long the girl had, or how long he would need to stall Homeland Security before they ruined everything. Already the suits had begun phoning it in, and if he knew anything about bureaucratic turf wars, which he rather unfortunately did, he knew this was a very, very bad sign, and that his current control of the situation was going to be very short-lived.

"No idea. I need to think, and I need to think very quickly." He waved over the technician carrying her readings, leafing through them without the ability to pay total attention to it. There were enough species that had evolved this particular lifecycle that he couldn't be exactly sure which he was dealing with- "That's something," he remarked to no one in particular, carefully lifting her head into a half-upright position.

"What do you have?" Diaz was doing his best to supervise the examination of the empty globe, which had split along what looked like carefully arraigned seams.

"They're a sentient species, they have to be, a magnetized covering sufficient to protect them through an atmospheric descent isn't something that you'd derive organically," He was a reaching a bit now, just hoping for some more information so that he could actually start formulating a real plan. "So they should be able to communicate with us." Another once-over with the screwdriver, just to make sure. "By article fifteen of the shadow proclamation, I demand that you name yourself." He paused a second, but she didn't so much as twitch. "You're in control now, she's got perfectly good vocal chords, use them."

This time he was rewarded with a flutter of her eyelashes, though her eyes remained rolled back in her head, as though it was just a systems check. Her lips twitched, and her mouth opened, though the voice that replied was a freakish copy of her own, with the same pitch but none of the right inflection. "We are the Swarm."

Diaz gestured dramatically behind the Doctor, doing his best to get his people to look up anything and everything that might be one file about something referred to as a Swarm. It certainly didn't sound good, that was for sure.

"Where are you from?" He'd heard of the Swarm, but only obliquely, so it hadn't been his first choice of possible parasities. That wasn't necessarily bad, though it limited his options.

"So far away…" The voice was so flat, so wrong, even if it was technically right. "The skies were so empty there, so cold."

"Is that why you're here?" The Doctor continued questioning, wanting as much as he could before whatever window of time that Cat had before he could no longer safely remove the parasites.

"So cold." It might have been a little more effective if they had managed to get anything other than a flat monotone, but the meaning was clear. "There were such empty skies and we were so hungry…" However unaffected, there was something even more unsettling about those words coming from her mouth.

"If that's all you want, I can find you another planet," There were species that might not mind something like this, or uninhabited moons he could maroon them on, if they would only let her go…

"But we like it here," was what would have been a rather petulant reply, had they had the finesse, "it's so warm… so many people…"

"That's a direct threat, Doctor," Diaz interrupted, not exactly thrilled with what he had to say, but knowing he had to say it all the same. There were very specific protocols for direct threats, particularly ones that were (currently) so well contained. It also started a countdown to the takeover, as if there was one time that Homeland Security was authorized to take control, it was from a direct threat. It meant they had to think fast, or rather, that the Doctor had to think fast.

"I noticed," Was the Doctor's rather curt reply, as he tried to think of a way to convince whatever it was that was possessing her that they would be far better off somewhere else. "What if I just find you another host? Can you leave her?" He wasn't sure who he had to offer that he could offer, other than possibly himself, but he'd find something. Would have to.

Her head lolled in his hands as they thought it over. "No." It was curt, snippy, even in monotone. "She's so warm…"

"Doctor?" It was one of the men in suits, who had, so far, spoken to no one other than his counterpart. His voice was short and clipped, as machine-like as he motions.

"I'm a little preoccupied right now," The Doctor was rather beyond being polite.

"I regret to inform you that Homeland Security department of the United States Government is now in charge of this operation, as we are authorized to do in event of a direct and clear threat on this country and its people." He flashed a badge, as though colored metal meant anything in the moment, before continuing. "And the incineration of this threat is the only currently available option."

"Incineration?" He didn't quite choke on the word, but it was a near thing. "You are not going to kill her until I've had a chance to figure this out-"

"And you are not going to endanger this country over a single girl." Was the snap of a reply, as the man turned to his compatriot. "Ready the incinerator."

"Just give me time! That's all I need," The Doctor jumped to his feet, not about to let them incinerate her (just the idea of it was awful enough) before he'd had a chance to properly figure this out. He'd find something; he always did, some way to fix it all. This was what he did best, wasn't it? Snap decisions and brilliant plans improvised at the last possible moment?

"You have approximately ten minutes until it reaches peak temperature." The man didn't bother sparing a backward glance as he turned on his heel to go supervise the preparations.


	6. What you want is accident

"I can't overrule him," Diaz offered his condolences, though he had a feeling that the Doctor really didn't care about chains of command or proper emergency procedures. It wasn't the first time Homeland had stepped in like this, taken over, and lacked the necessary subtlety. But that didn't mean he could do anything about it.

The Doctor ignored him completely, starting to pace as he muttered to himself. "Think, think, think, think…" His hair stuck up angrily where he'd mussed it. "The answer is here. The answer has to be here. It's always here…" Worst came to worst, he'd find a way to get her to the TARDIS, get out. He hadn't given up that there was a way to reverse this, to remove them without destroying her (how would he tell her family? Did she have a family? She'd called someone earlier, but he hadn't asked- there was so much he hadn't asked). Even if there weren't, there were enough uninhabited moons and planets out there that he wasn't worried about putting anyone in too much danger right away; after all, the species had a certain amount of time it would need to incubate before it would eat through her, at least, he hoped it did.

"Is there anything you need?" They did have some of the most sophisticated equipment available anywhere that wasn't Torchwood, though he doubted that would be any real consolation.

"I need time, and that's exactly what I don't have." The Doctor didn't mean to snap at Diaz, knew on some level that it wasn't his fault, that he couldn't do anything about the situation. But that didn't help him, not in the least. He looked at him, dark eyes almost too intense to take. "He didn't even know her name." Because sometimes, it was the simple things that mattered.

Simple things, names. Names. He froze for a moment, thinking. "I heard that name before… where did I-Oh!" Suddenly, things fell into focus, rapidly, all at once. The upside of being clever. "The Saturn satellites!" He was nearly shouting now, gesticulating wildly.

The others in the room blinked at him, not sure if this revelation was supposed to mean anything to anyone other than him. Several of the lab techs that he'd harassed earlier, were rather convinced that despite his reputation and earlier brilliance, that he'd probably cracked.

"The Saturn satellites are desert planets," He continued, on fire now. "Where's Roswell? A desert. I asked them why they came here, and what did they say? It was warm here. What's her temperature?" He asked, turning suddenly on whoever was monitoring the equipment they'd set up.

"Hundred and three and spiking," The technician supplied, not sure if she followed.

"Heat! That's exactly it. They need heat!" It was all falling into place now, and for a moment, he felt that he might actually pull it off. Another daring rescue, another miraculous save whipped out from nowhere.

Diaz was nodding along now, suddenly comprehending. "There's a refrigeration system on the floor above us."

He shook his head at that, still pacing. Needing to stay in motion to keep thinking. "Too slow… ice! Get me ice!" he declared suddenly, flapping his hands at the various officials and scientists and whatever that had been crowded along. "Ice and salt, and lots of it."

"There's an ice bath in the infirmary," Diaz supplied, motioning for his personnel to yes, go run and fetch whatever they were asked to fetch. It would be egregiously flouting protocol to interfere where Homeland had stepped it, but as long as this worked, he was fairly sure that they'd manage alright. That also meant that it really did have to work, for his sake as well as Cat's.

"Perfect." He'd paused for a moment, holding still for almost a breath, before dropping back down to again check Cat's heartbeat. "Tell them to hurry." She hadn't been traveling with him long, not long at all considering. But they'd been through quite a bit in that length of time, long enough for her to trust him. Long enough that he couldn't shake the guilt that he'd gotten her into this, that she would have been perfectly fine if he'd just left her there, sitting so lonely on those steps. Long enough that he should have caught that she wasn't feeling well, that it wasn't normal. Long enough that he wasn't about to let this be the end of it.

It wasn't more than another few breaths before the men returned, dragging a large metal bin and a great deal of ice. "I need this as cold as you can possible make it," he directioned, watching them layer ice and salt, ice and salt. It was only another minute or so of waiting, of wanting this to be a as brilliant as he hoped it was, but it was eternity of a minute.

"What are you going to do?" Diaz asked, as gently as he could. The physics of it all make sense, as much sense as anything could when you worked for an agency that investigated extra-terrestrials, but he wasn't sure what it would do to her.

"Freeze them out." He was still short, not really concerned with anyone's feelings right now. He didn't want to elaborate, not all that sure himself what was going to happen. If this would work. Because it had to, because he didn't have any other brilliant ideas up his sleeve. "Careful now," He cautioned as they lifted her, steadying her head himself. "This needs to be as fast as possible. And plunged her into the freezing water.

She contorted in ways she wasn't capable of conscious, thrashing against them as whatever was inside her reacted, wanting out of the paralyzing cold. "Cold…." Was all that they could manage, preoccupied as her heated body melted the ice, only increasing the inescapable chill.

"I'm really very sorry," He apologized, to the unconscious part of her that would be very confused as to why she was black and blue once this was all over as they held her down, held her down in the poisonous cold.

After the first minute, once they realized that she couldn't get out, the screaming started. Shrieks of the dying, they were sharp and hollow, and far too close to her real voice.

"I'm so sorry," He repeated, taking her face in both hands for a moment, before plunging her fully underwater, and holding her there.

She continued thrashing, harder and harder. Until, not more than few minutes later, she suddenly stopped, still. Motionless.

Wary, he waited another eternity of a second before he let go, letting her surface. Had this really worked, or had he-

With a sudden gasp, she started, eyes open wide and blue this time, before choking and finally coughing up what looked like a thick, grayish slime. Once she could breathe again, she looked around, more than a little confused to find herself up to her neck in ice water, with what looked like half the building staring at her. "What the hell?" Was all she managed, as the last thing she remembered had been going for a bit of a walk…

He let out a sigh of relief. That was Cat alright, he thought to himself, as he helped her out and wrapped her in his coat. That would be her.


	7. Light a candle's end

Cat flinched a little, looking away as the nurse drew yet another vial of blood, trying not to make any faces. She was normally alright with that sort of thing, not over fond of needles but plenty tolerant, that was, until they'd needed what looked like roughly half her blood to run the battery of tests needed to confirm that she was alien-free. It didn't help that despite the set of dry fatigues she'd been lent and the Doctor's coat that she was still freezing, something about the plunge she'd taken and the brief possession that had chilled her beyond normal.

"Haven't I been through enough?" She complained, though quietly, as the nurse went to run the sample through yet another complicated series of examinations. "Isn't it enough to get infected by creatures that wanted to eat me, then frozen and half-drowned? Do I need to be a pincushion too?" She rolled her eyes, clearly done with the whole experience. "I swear, if they put me in one more machine…" What, exactly, she was planning to when that happened she left unclear, figuring it would be more of an improv sort of thing. And she was planning to be very creative. She eyed the Doctor sitting next to her warily. "That includes you. If that screwdriver comes anywhere near me…" She did her best to threaten him with her eyes, though that would have been rather more effective if her bangs hadn't dried sticking up in all sorts of odd angles.

It also would have been more effective if he hadn't been threatened by all sorts of things that were much, much scarier than your average damp coed. "You're lucky they're letting you leave at all, much less running tests." The Homeland Security operatives had been none too pleased to return to find a conscious and outwardly alien-free Cat where'd they'd left a conveniently unconscious and disposable one, and he'd had to agree to the completely unnecessary examinations to be able to actually remove her from the building. "You could've been the newest exhibit."

She glared at him, unamused by the comparison. "Yeah, me, the blender and the fire extinguisher. Brilliant."

He laughed at her, though it was more out of relief that she seemed perfectly back to normal, and was currently un-incinerated, than because she was particularly entertaining. "Though, I'm pretty sure you made it on the No-Fly list for this." That, and his deliberate flouting of Homeland, but he was pretty sure she wouldn't object to anything that kept her alive.

"Good." She eyed the nurse suspiciously, anticipating more needle pricks. "My first time in America, and what happens? I get infected by aliens planning to eat their way out through my eyeballs. I think I'm good." She was sure that there were probably perfectly lovely bits of the country that weren't plagued by wasps that liked to nest in human beings, but at the moment, she didn't care to chance it.

"Your eyeballs?" He cocked his head at her. They hadn't mentioned any body parts in particular when he'd spoken to them, and she hadn't really let on that she'd remembered much at all about the whole ordeal.

She shrugged, shifting in her seat more out of boredom than discomfort. "It seemed appropriate."

"Excuse me?" The nurse offered, not exactly sure if they would mind being interrupted during what was a perfectly cheerful discussion to be given the good news. "But I think you're clear to go, Ms. Davies. You're in perfect health." He didn't add that several interesting antibodies that been found in her system, whether they were from general exposure to other times and spaces or the incident in question, but they had been screened out and with the proper analysis, were expected to offer all sorts of disease-fighting opportunities. It wasn't UNIT policy.

"Fantastic!" She hopped up, nearly tripping over the hem of the coat that had gotten wrapped around her during the nearly interminable wait. "Let's get going!"

\

Most of UNIT seemed to be packed into the hangar to see them off, much the way they were when they'd arrived, only this time, it was to make sure they caught of glimpse of the pair of them (Cat, having been the center of the entire dramatic event, was now nearly just as interesting). One never knew when the next time the Doctor would come to call.

"Have a safe trip, Doctor." Diaz, standing by the transport, waved them over, and then, with a hint of cheek, very deliberately saluted.

The Doctor sent him another look, having warmed more to the man now that there was no need for split-second decisions or shouting, however intertwined those two seemed to get. "You shouldn't be getting anything like that again, at least, not any time soon."While they'd been running their tests on Cat, he'd done his best to verify that that had been the only bit of the Swarm close enough to hit atmosphere. It might have been more definite had he actually been willing to leave her side long enough to use the proper equipment, but he certainly hadn't been.

"And if we do, I think we've got a handle on how to deal with them." Step one, was, of course, to remove every last Homeland Security operative from the base, but that went without saying. "And if not, we know who to call."

The Doctor only nodded at that, feeling no need to fill in that, as a time-traveler, he so very rarely ran into any one person more than once. So it was with a certain amount of finality that they hopped back into the jeep, to be driven back out to the TARDIS, to make their exit.

Wilson drove again; having threatened to deck the officer chosen to replace him, though this time it was in even more awe-struck silence. This included Cat this time, as he'd decided (having not been quite important enough to be there) that it had had something to do with her as a person; that she was just as special as he'd wanted her to be.

He only spoke when he parked in front of the unobtrusive police box, something he wouldn't have seen at all (despite having read up enough on the perception field) had it not been pointed out to him. Opening the door, he flashed another salute. "It was an honor, sir." He said, with great feeling.

The Doctor didn't bother correcting him, only giving him a respectful sort of nod as he headed straight for his- that was where he almost ran out of words, proper terms for what the TARDIS was for him. Because it was everything; home and travel, impossible opportunity and possibly trapped up within blue walls that already held so much more than they should.

Cat would have seconded the feeling had she not been half-asleep; the day had been much longer than she'd anticipated, and as soon as the constant going had stopped, as soon as she lacked that anticipation that had kept her alert (and annoyed) throughout the testing, she'd nearly succumbed to the sudden exhaustion. Leaning on him, not even really realizing how much of her weight he was supporting, she gave Wilson a cheeky little wave, before disappearing between those swinging doors. Into the realm of anything-goes.

Though at the moment, it was far more like anything went… tomorrow. Yawning, she took a quick moment to just look around them, to soak in, yet again, just how fantastic it all was. How happy she was that he'd stopped by her campus that day; that he'd chosen to follow whatever he'd been following at what was just the right time. That he'd decided he had room for someone else in his life; that he decided she was the sort of person he could live with. That she deserved to see the stars. Not that she'd let him know, not beyond that quick flash of softness in her eyes, not beyond the momentary gratitude on her face, along with a little bit of amazement at how quickly she'd adjusted to it all. How she could look at the TARDIS and think more about sleep, than what fantastic place they'd be going next. Instead, she twisted her mouth into something far more sarcastic. "You better take me somewhere nice next time," She admonished him; shrugging off his coat and tossing it back the best she could while leaning against a wall for support. "Because I am kind of done with deserts and infections, alright?"

He hadn't quite caught all of that, but he didn't need to, as he knew well enough she wouldn't be about to appreciate him calling her out on it. "Next time, just don't wander off. It's the first rule of traveling, _don't_ wander off, and no one ever seems to listen."

She made a face at him. "Because you do such a good job of focusing on one destination. How many museums did you drag me into?"

"I didn't decide to go playing with the thing that fell from the sky now, did I?" Though one would assume that in roughly nine hundred years one would grow out of that sort of thing.

She was fairly sure she still had a case for 'it wasn't my fault' but decided to let it go with a bit of a shrug. "You know, there's a reason why I'm a Cat and not a Cathy," She acknowledged, though with the Doctor around, she might be getting more than the allotted nine lives, particularly if she started counting from the first moment they'd met. But, wondering about all that was really rather academic at the moment, because she wasn't worried. Because where ever they ended up, he had her back.

\

**AN: There we go, an episode actually finished the way it was supposed to be! Now, I'd include a preveiw of what's to come but I'm not quite sure how the post scheudle is going to be - I'm doing a month abroad, which means its between a hiatus as I'm too busy to write, or quite a lot posted as I die of boredom on six-hour train rides. Hopefully, it'll be the latter, but we'll have to see. **


End file.
